Storage devices commonly implement data replication operations, e.g., for data archiving and recovery. Data in virtual libraries may be replicated in another virtual library at a remote site. However, the backup application is not allowed to “see” the virtual library at the remote site because the backup application typically is not configured to handle two or more copies of the data (e g., having the same name, barcode, and/or contents, etc.) Accordingly, the backup application cannot access the remote virtual library.
Enterprise customers often desire to backup data at the remote site on a physical medium (e.g., a backup tape). The physical medium serves as a “carved-off” physical copy of the virtual library, and may be saved for use as an archive, test tape, etc. Because the physical medium is different from the virtual library (e.g., perhaps having a different barcode, size, cartridge type, retention time, or contents, etc.), the backup application needs to be used for copying the data from the virtual storage to the physical medium. Specifically, a virtual tape cannot be replicated on a physical tape if the virtual tape and physical tape have different characteristics (e.g., different sizes, different barcodes, and different contents). For example, multiple 100 GB virtual tapes may be copied onto a single 800 GB physical tape, and therefore the backup application must be in control. In other words, the virtual storage cannot simply be replicated to the physical medium. But since the backup application cannot handle both local and remote virtual libraries, other solutions are needed to copy a remote virtual library to a remote physical medium.
A virtual library may be used for “tape stacking” where multiple virtual tapes are copied onto a physical tape. But the physical tape cannot be restored directly by the backup application since the “stacked tape” is a custom format created by the virtual library, and thus would have to be “de-staged” back onto the virtual tape library store before restoring the data.
Another copy of the backup application may be installed at the remote site. This copy of the backup application can be used to access the remote virtual library and make copies to the remote physical medium. However, there requires multiple instances of the backup application to track both the virtual libraries and the backup on the physical medium. This approach also requires that the customer license separate backup applications.